skeptic, suggest that managers should rely entirely on their intuition and experience, and as a determinist, suggest that planning is a waste of time because everything is self- regulatory, suggesting an anarchic kind of system.
Most bureaucratic systems such as Universities obliviously operate under this skeptic paradigm when it comes to administrative functions. Chapter Four reveals this phenomenon. This becomes a great challenge for a corporate strategy to be realized, and ultimately creates interconnected problems as discussed in Chapter One. These interconnected problems need soft systems, emancipatory and critical systems, and systems dynamics in order to improve.
Checkland's (1981) soft systems methodology adapts well in evaluating and improving corporate strategy, following a multiple perspectives approach. An emancipatory systems approach, will, explains Jackson 1991a (Midgley 1996: 14) address three human interests, namely: prediction and control, mutual understanding, and freedom from oppressive power relations. Critical systems, as discussed by Ulrich (1996) which he termed critical heuristics, is about redefining the societal notion of planning, by giving people a new understanding and competence in matters of societal change. Peter Senge (1990), and Jay Forrester (1994) promoted systems dynamics as a management paradigm.
Both these systems thinkers emphasized the systems causal loops to determine the relationship and reinforcement of problems that keep on recurring. In this debate of strategy and people, the emphasis is that soft systems as defined by Luckett (2004) is an approach that is relevant for complex, unbound, and ill-defined situations, and such situations usually involve service employees. The systems approach assists in creating a holistically minded paradigm in dealing with people, be they customers or employees.
2.8.2 How do people create knowledge for decision-making in service organizations?
Management as a discipline has come a long way from Adam Smith's specialization approach, Frederick Taylor's scientific management "efficiency", "one best way"
approach, Elton Mayo's human resources and behavioural approaches, systems thinking popularized by Ludwig von Bertalanffy, to Edward Deming's' total quality management (TQM), business process engineering (BPR), participative and diversity management,
and knowledge management. Itis important to note that systems thinking should be seen as a philosophy, rather than a management technique, because it transcends many disciplines. Bertalanffy (Flood & Carson, 1988: 2) envisaged a framework of concepts and theory that would be equally applicable to many fields of interest. As Bertalanffy said:
... the concept (of systems) has pervaded all fields of science and penetrated into popular thinking, jargon and mass media. Systems thinking plays a dominant role in a wide range of fields from industrial enterprise and armaments to esoteric topics of pure science.
(Bertalanffy, 1969).
Most of the management approaches discussed in this question were developed through hard systems paradigms. Knowledge management creates a learning process where people share knowledge through imparting tacit knowledge and communicating explicit knowledge. Knowledge management seeks to systemically synthesise data and information into actionable knowledge for decision-making.
Peter Senge (1994) suggested that the 1990's should create learning organizations. He further explained that learning organizations should discover how to tap people's commitment and capacity to learn at all levels in an organization. Forrester (1994) made it clear that system dynamics should be a catalyst for organizational learning. He explained that systems dynamics modeling is a participative activity in which one learns by trial and error and practice. This is important, because it allows people to be creative, innovative, and relentlessly try new ways of meeting and exceeding customer expectations.
Argyris (1999: 4) said that learning organizations stress the development of human resources capability for questioning, experimenting, adapting and innovating on the organization's behalf Argyris emphasized that organizational culture can assist in the creation of organizational learning. Knowledge management is applied through a knowledge management system (KMS), and the people component of KMS establishes communities of practice (COP), and an information technology database management system. Knowledge management is compatible with learning as a soft systems approach.
2.8.3 How do service employees facilitate good quality? How do service employees facilitate customer satisfaction?
Usually when there are defective products, some managers (those who follow a hard system paradigm) look for the causes at the production department. When a quantitative customer research reports that customers are not happy with service, managers tend to look for causes from front-line employees. Generally, we tend to focus on snapshots of isolated parts of the system, and wonder why our deepest problems never seem to get solved contends Senge (1994). The machine age, explains Ackoff(1994) taught people to think that everything in the universe could be explained by cause and effect. Quality of service and the satisfaction of customers with service are very complex issues. They are complex because they cannot be clearly defined, quality is very subjective, and it is dynamic. The following causal loop diagram in figure 8 shows the vicious circle of variables that recur, continuously generating customer dissatisfaction.
Causal loop diagram depicting the reinforcement of problems in a service environment
~----;:;cn'o~petitors
unkno unclear
r
corporat~Strategy ~rganisationalstringent customer. structure;
~satisfact~on
Counter productive / )
policies staffa~'tude . poo~
~
managementfunctional No teamwork /servicestyle
Figure 8
Causal loop diagram: customer service
Source: n05 course material (2004), Open University
The above causal loop in figure 8 seeks to depict multiple loops which reinforce one another positively and negatively, creating a homeostatic self-regulatory system. This shows how customer dissatisfaction can evolve and cause a serious threat to organizational survival. The diagram also shows that many factors in the system contribute, and that this view is contrary to most customer surveys that look at the problem situation non-systemically.
As demonstrated in the previous section, service employees represent quality. Now from this viewpoint, service employees should be viewed holistically, rather than as the front- office or back office, managers or supervisors. The total quality management doctrine advocates this holistic view in terms of customers i.e. internal (employees) and external customers (suppliers & consumers). In answering the question about how service employees facilitate good quality, a causal loop diagram (see figure 8) and multiple cause diagram can be used to study the relationship of all stakeholders involved in delivering service. Further questions could relate to whether quality is identified through reliability, responsiveness, competence, understanding, etc., whether everybody in the system is reliable, responsive, competent, understanding, etc. In answering the customer satisfaction question, another question arises, as to whether service employees are empowered to deliver good quality, and satisfactory service.